


Billy Tepper and the...

by Thia (Jennaria)



Category: Toy Soldiers (1991)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-09-29
Updated: 2004-09-29
Packaged: 2017-10-06 09:49:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/52356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jennaria/pseuds/Thia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of those days.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Billy Tepper and the...

**Author's Note:**

> Equal parts 'Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day', the real-life very bad days of some of my closest friends, and the urge to write something small while the Story that Ate My Life continues to, well, eat my life. Herewith fluff -- or as fluff as you can get when you're talking bad days. (And my unending thanks to the Usual Suspect for beta-reading and reminding me that Alexander is six and Billy isn't.)

I woke up this morning and looked at my clock radio and realized the reason I hadn't woken up to a loud BEEP BEEP BEEP was because that thing I'd tripped over on my way to bed last night had been the cord to the radio which meant I'd unplugged the fucker. My wrist-watch said 8:55 which meant five minutes until breakfast ended and classes started. I had the feeling it was going to be a terrible horrible no-good very bad day.

I threw myself out of bed and banged my elbow right on my fucking funny-bone and wasted a minute or so stomping around the room swearing and clutching at it. At least neither Joey nor Phil were there to see me. Then I stomped over to my clothes, picked up a pair of jeans, sniffed, and remembered that almost everything I owned was dirty, I was gonna do laundry last night and hadn't so I was reduced to scrounging through the closet and drawers for something, anything, to wear and wound up wearing jeans so old they were practically falling off me and one of Joey's button-down shirts that didn't quite fit right but I didn't have any other choice. I ran down to the caf and grabbed something to eat. They didn't have any coffee or even that tea Joey likes or sausage or bacon or anything except runny eggs that tasted like heat lamp. This was _really_ turning out to be a terrible horrible no-good very bad day. Maybe I could go somewhere way the fuck away from Massachusetts, transfer instead of getting kicked out. Do they have boarding schools in Virginia?

I got to math ten minutes late and Mr. Lavine gave me the eye and wanted to know where my homework was. I looked him right in the eye and said, "Oops," because I hadn't done the fucking homework, so I had to sit there and do the homework right away instead of listening to whatever Lavine was teaching. I asked Ric what Lavine was writing on the board, because he was sitting next to me, but he didn't understand it either, or if he did he wasn't willing to write it out on a note. Guess I shouldn't bother looking for boarding schools in California. I went to English next and found out we had a paper due which I hadn't even _known_ about, and Mr. Echols gave me detention for the next three days and told me I could write the paper then. Hank didn't have his paper either but he only got detention for one day. Clearly this was not just a terrible horrible no-good very bad day, but the lousiest day of my fucking life.

In American History Mr. Waverly stuck us in assigned seating so Joey sat way up front and I was stuck in the back next to Josh McAllister who thinks wearing a red bandanna on his head makes him look cool. Mr. Waverly turned out all the lights and started some movie about the War of 1812 that was all full of voice-overs and bad portraits. I was sitting right near the projector but when I tilted back in my chair to accidentally-on-purpose drop something into the projector so it'd break and we wouldn't have to watch any more of the movie, my chair overbalanced and I landed on my elbow hard, which was of course the same elbow I landed on when I fell out of bed this morning. I didn't even manage to spike the projector as I fell. Mr. Waverly sent me to the infirmary. I decided to take the long way around. Not Virginia, that wasn't far enough. South America, maybe.

The nurse spotted me before I spotted her and dragged me into the infirmary room and tapped at my elbow and said, "Hmmmm," and then told me it wasn't actually broken or anything interesting so all I could have was two Tylenol and a pass back to class. I hate Tylenol. I didn't even manage to escape the rest of the movie except maybe fifteen minutes and I had to sit in my same seat again and Josh McAllister was snickering. When I went to French class, Monsieur kept asking me questions like, "Qu'est-ce que c'est passé à ton coud?" and "As-tu apporté les devoirs qui sont en retard?" and "Et le plus-que-parfait, Monsieur Tepper?" Snuffy passed me a note asking where I got my shirt because obviously I have no fashion sense and Monsieur saw it and made me read it aloud, in French, to everyone. Then Hank passed me a note already written in French saying I was a douchebag. I wrote back in English saying look who's talking, but he didn't even read it. This was the _worst_ terrible horrible no-good very bad day in existence.

We had to stand around for twenty minutes before we could have lunch. "Kitchen fire," Ric said. I didn't believe him but when lunch was finally served the only hot food was Sloppy Joe because everything else was burned up except soup which was the same soup they'd served since the beginning of the school year. I went for dessert so I could have something edible but they were out of everything except tapioca pudding, and Phil caught me on the way back to the table to say he didn't want to sit with me because I looked like a lamer, and he wasn't going to sneak out to the bell tower tonight the way we'd been planning for three weeks, he was going to go learn poker from Snuffy.

I said, "Snuffy sucks at poker."

Phil said, "I don't care."

In Bio Mr. Gygax gave us a pop quiz. He said it would decide what he'd teach us for the rest of the month. He graded them right away and held up Ric's as an example of what to do right and let Ric leave the class and go do something fun. I got mine back with SEE ME written on it in red. He wrote up the homework on the board and it was twice the amount we'd ever gotten before. I decided South America wasn't far enough away. Maybe I could transfer to Australia. Terrible horrible no-good very bad days couldn't find me there, and if they did, I could sic a kangaroo on 'em. Or maybe a dingo.

After Bio was supposed to be a free period only today I had soccer practice, which meant we went upstairs and changed and jogged outside to find out it was really cloudy and threatening to rain. Ric said it wouldn't really rain, and ran for the gym. Joey said, "How would he know, he's from California," and ran after him. I ran too, only I got into a shoving match with a couple of the other guys and wound up falling and skidding along the grass as if I were trying to steal bases in baseball because I hadn't realized the grass was wet. Nobody applauded, even though I'd wound up going the right direction and hadn't landed on the same elbow I'd bashed twice or anything. We got out the balls and started kicking them around and nobody would kick the ball to me even when I was wide open and could've kicked it right past Joey at goal. Just as the period was ending it started to rain anyway and didn't stop until just as we were back to the school. I wonder if even Australia is far enough.

I went to shower and change and go to dinner, only I didn't even get to the shower because the dean pulled me into his office and talked at me for an hour about my grades and how I seemed to be concentrating on 'inappropriate subjects'. I told him that was bullshit. He told me to watch my mouth. I thought about telling him not to worry, I was going to transfer to someplace way the fucking hell away from here, like New Zealand or Italy or someplace, but even without that I still got probation for the next month, which means no official permitted going off-campus until I get off probation.

I showered and changed back into the same tight jeans and Joey shirt and went downstairs to find the dining hall all closed up and kicked the door and stubbed my toe. Then I stomped upstairs again without limping and slammed into my room and found Joey sitting at his desk doing some reading or something.

"How'd it go?" he asked.

"Same shit, different day," I said. "Maybe worse shit than usual."

He put down his book and turned around and his eyes were all dark and confused, like he hadn't even noticed that I'd been running around all day wearing one of his shirts. "What happened?"

So I told him, about the alarm clock and no coffee and no homework and my elbow and Phil being a prick and the Bio quiz and soccer practice and the dean, even though he was there for most of it, and he just sat there and listened. Finally I finished by explaining it had been a terrible horrible no-good very bad day and I was transferring to Italy as soon as I could figure out how. He actually grinned.

"Don't go to Italy, man. Way too fucking hot for you."

"Yeah, well, if you've got a better idea," I said, "then I'm willing to listen."

He pushed out his chair and walked over to me and kissed me, casual as if he did it every day only I think I'd remember if I'd ever been kissed by my best friend before. It took me a second to really realize this wasn't some kind of joke, the capper to the worst terrible horrible no-good very bad day ever, but Joey kissing me open-mouthed like he actually wanted to kiss me. After that second I opened my mouth too and kissed him back, awkward trying to figure out angles so we didn't bump noses or clash teeth, just the touch of his tongue against the inside of my lip and I was getting hard, turning on to just an awkward kiss. A kiss from Joey. Why hadn't I ever thought of this before?

We got undressed ("Wait," Joey said, "that looks like my shirt,") and I locked the door because Phil could stay out all night playing bad poker if he wanted, I didn't care anymore, this was a lot more interesting than the bell tower. Then I came back and Joey and I lay down on my bed and kissed some more and I tried to be all adult and not just come the second Joey touched me because this was _Joey_. I did anyway and felt really stupid for a second, except by then I had my fingers on Joey too and he gasped my name and his head fell forward against me as he came. He didn't move away afterwards, so I reached out and wrapped my arms around him, wiping my hand off first as well as I could because I wanted to hold Joey, not gross him out. I think he knew because he grinned against my skin and kissed my collarbone.

Maybe he did it just to cheer me up after an incredibly terrible horrible no-good very bad day. But I don't think so. Joey's taste in my mouth and warmth against my side don't feel like pity. I'm taking this and spitting in the eye of whoever the fuck thinks they can get me down and holding onto this with both hands. In another couple minutes, I'll even get up and do the homework due tomorrow.

But first I'm gonna lie here with Joey, and maybe in a couple minutes, I'll kiss him just to make sure he knows that yeah, some days are like that, but sometimes you can really turn them around.

-end-


End file.
